I am not sure what the words are that I want to convey here today. This morning started with tearful prayer very deep in the middle of the woods in WV. I often run to my Father on the harder things. I am a tough cookie but so very tenderhearted. I wrote this song and I think it fits my heart today. When I was in school and even now I am more of a literalist who keeps things simple. So if you think this is about rain it’s not. It’s about the pouring in our soul of hard things. No one gets through this life untouched. Some carry deep deep self inflicted wounds. I know for me it was a huge wounding that caused a series of events that lead me to Dallas. I thank God for loving me enough to put my character over my comfort. What I have learned here has been priceless. Whether you throw yourself in a pit or someone else does. A pit is a pit. Life has to go on even in those times and it can get muddy when you mix law and grace to sort the proper approach to it all. I am finding the older I get the more I see. Christ is about freedom at the very cost of his life. He said he came to set the captives free. My heart is that you are free.

Luke 4:18
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised,

This was the answer Jesus gave in the synagogue proclaiming the reason he came to earth. Sometimes we just get the idea he came to save us from sin. He said that but in reading in the passage as he spoke from the book of Isaiah he also said the rest of the story if you will. Saving a man’s soul from hell is truly amazing. We all deserve hell! God’s heart is revealed here for much more for us. If you look closely at this verse you will see how he views the damages of sin and see his plan to heal the brokenness, to free our mind and to give us new vision so that we who are bruised by the ravages of sin are truly free. That’s the key how free are you? I know it’s not all about us. But to GOD it is all about us. It was all about the kingdom and molding and transforming our minds and lives to something of substance. In his own words the “abundant life” is what he said he came to provide. Sin is a hard task master. The way of the transgressor is hard as the Bible says but that is exactly why we trust Jesus who is the way the truth and the life.

Here’s something I have seen when a person does fall. There are two ways they handle that. For me I quickly try to handle it and to repent and turn away from it. Yet in fairness I am not the kind whose tender heart can just jump in feet first for a long season of sin. I am too much the kind of lamb that clings to my Father. For others they repent but still cling to the aftermath. I wrote this song in October 2009. We have to ask ourselves sometimes if we are trying to pay more for our sin than Christ did?

East Texas Rain

East Texas rain

on my window pane,

Falling in my heart

tearing me apart

Texas ain’t my home, something bigger is calling me

I been gone to long too far from where I ought to be.

Will I ever get

To a home again?

How can I go?

How can I know?

You will take me in

I gave my heart,

Every single part

Complete surrender

Loving and tender

Don’t trust your fear

Just draw me near

Hold me in your arms

Keep me safe from harm